Sam sighs, pushing at his eyes with a thumb and forefinger. He’s still in the same clothes he was in last night, a flannel shirt and faded jeans as if he got the call as he was settling down to dinner. I’d say he slept in them, but the hollowed-out shadows under his eyes tell me he got about as much sleep as I did, which was none. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the dark stain on Micah’s dock. I smelled the blood and gunpowder and fear, the way bone and brain drizzled down like rain. It was so much easier to stay awake.

“Charlie, what do you say we cut the crap? I’ve got confessions on record from both Jax and Paul that make them accessories to manslaughter on top of a heaping pile of other charges. They’re going to prison, probably not as long as I’d like them to, but they’re going.”

“Is this the part where you say I told you so?”

“No. This is the part where I say if there’s anything you’re holding back on, then you should tell it to an attorney. As soon as we’re done searching Micah’s house, we’re coming here next.”

For some reason, his words rile me up, and my shoulders hike to my ears. “Why would I need an attorney when all of this is news to me? I don’t have anything to hide. I didn’t know about Bobby, about Katherine, about any of it. I learned all these things last night, like everybody else in this room. But if you’re looking for someone to blame, you may want to check with Chief Hunt and Diana, because from everything I heard, I’m guessing they knew all along.”

Sam runs it down for us, how Paul’s and Jax’s statements have opened the floodgates. How our old friends and neighbors from the trailer park are stepping forward one by one, claiming their eyewitness accounts were ignored or buried. How a power-hungry Chief Hunt actively participated in the cover-up, then twenty years later did it again, when Sienna’s investigation connected his son to Bobby’s death.

“We’re searching Chief’s house. Micah’s, too. If something’s there, we’ll find it.”

“No, you won’t. Micah told me Sienna’s things were somewhere no one will ever know to look. The bottom of the lake, probably.”

“Micah wasn’t the only one with motive and opportunity. So far, we haven’t found one person who can verify your husband’s alibi.”

Chet leans onto the countertop with both elbows. “Dude, you can’t be serious. Jax was wearing her scarf.”